Gavazzi won Stage 1
09/02/2009

SENAWANG: The rider from Diquigiovanni-Androni, Mattia Gavazzi prolong the excellence of the team from the previous year by winning the first stage of Le Tour de Langkawi today.

The strategy of the team from Venezuela, which had won the team general classification in the previous edition of LTdL proved to be rewarding as Gavazzi lead another 119 riders competing in the stage 1 of 133.8km today.

“Everything went well for my team today as we managed to lead the bunch as we had planned before.”

“My team has work very hard and I only finished the race today,” said the rider who had just won the first stage of Tour de San Luis in Argentina last month.

The rider from Italy finished the race in a big group in 3 hours, 6 minutes and 42 seconds and managed to win the yellow jersey jointly sponsored by Proton and TM and also the green jersey sponsored by MILO after he managed to accumulate 15 points in sprint zone.

He said that both win (Tour de San Luis and LTdL 2009) in quite a short time is totally unexpected and unique.

The talent of the 25-year old rider must have been in th bloodline as his father, Pierino Gavaz was the three-time champion Italian National Road Race Championship.

As for the polka dot jersey , sponsored by Resort World Berhad became Jaco Venter’s from the National Team of South Africa with 4 points at the climb zone in Bukit Puyoh at a mere 170meter.

“I’m ecstatic to win the polka dot jersey today as the climb is suitable for me compared to the climb stage in Genting which is for sure more of a feat compared to this.”

“From the early kilometer, I have been striving to break away from the bunch and I hope I get to do that in the next stage also,” he added.

As for the rider from MNCF Cycling Team, Mohd Akmal Amrun, he managed to be in the fifth place overall after he excel in the sprint zone in Kajang, Semenyih and Nilai.

The 22-year old rider managed to accumulate two points each in the sprint zone in Kajang and Semenyih and another five points in Nilai, which is at kilometer 93.8 of today’s race.

Not only that, he also managed to be in the second place during the climb zone in Bukit Puyoh and secured the fifth place overall and become the second best rider of Asia.

The rider of National Team Malaysia, Ahmad Haidar Anuawar today finished the race in th seventh place while his teammate, Anuar Manan was in the tenth place.

After all 20 teams had their ‘warm up’ today in the first stage, the second stage will be more challenging for our national team to keep their performance as it is a distance of 160.9km.

The second stage will start in Senawang through the clim,b zone in Bukit Inas and then thru the climb zone in Tampin, Masjid Tanah and Cheng before it ends in Melaka.

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